David Spruce was born on 6th April 1896 at Aston and baptised on 31st May of that year at St Peter’s in Aston-by-Sutton. He was the son of William Spruce who was born at Dutton c. 1852 and his wife Emma (nee Howard) who was born c. 1852 at Croft near Winwick. The father was a bricklayer.
The 1901 Census recorded the family as living on Spenders Lane in Aston. William was employed as a journeyman bricklayer. David was the youngest of the eleven children of the family, of whom two had previously died, a son named George born in 1876 who died as a baby and another son named Thomas who was born in 1891 and who died a year later. David’s older brother William (born c.1882) and his older sisters Annie (born c. 1877), Jessie (born c.1878) and Emma (born c. 1880) had already left home. Another brother named Albert (born c. 1885) and sisters Sarah (born c. 1887), Ellen (born c. 1889) and Rose (born c. 1895) still lived at home.
Ten years later the father was working as a bricklayer on the Aston estate and Albert was a labouring gardener. It was not recorded as to whether Rose (17) and David (14) were at school or employed. They continued to live in Aston.
David served in the Great War in the 7th Cheshire Regiment as a Private with the service number 76588. No details are known of his war record. He appeared on the 1918 Electoral Roll for Aston as an absent voter on military service. By 1920 he was back home living with his parents in Aston. He never married.
William Spruce passed away in 1935.
The 1939 Register showed David living on Spenders Lane in Aston with his widowed mother Emma and his unmarried sister Rose. David was employed as a cowman and general agricultural labourer. Albert had previously left home to get married.
Emma Spruce passed away in 1941.
David Spruce died in 1954 in Aston at the age of 58 years.